Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

You are one of seven billion people on Earth. Whatever you or I do personally&#8212;eat tofu in a Hummer or hamburgers in a Prius&#8212;the planet doesnt notice. In our confrontation with climate change, species preservation, and a planet going off the cliff, it is what several billion people do that makes a difference. The solution? It isn't science, politics, or activism. It's smarter economics.

The hope of mankind, and indeed of every living thing on the planet, is now in the hands of the dismal science. Fortunately, weve been there before. Economists helped crack the acid rain problem in the 1990's (admittedly with a strong assist from a phalanx of lawyers and activists). Economists have helped get lead out of our gas, and they can explain why lobsters havent disappeared off the coast of New England but tuna is on the verge of extinction. More disquietingly, they can take the lessons of the financial crisis and model with greater accuracy than anyone else the likelihood of environmental catastrophe, and they can help save us from global warming, if only we let them.

Synopsis:

You are one of seven billion people on Earth. Put bluntly, whatever you do personally&#8212;eat tofu in a Hummer or hamburgers in a Prius&#8212;the planet doesnt care. Nor, for that matter, does the economy. In view of the entwined challenges of climate change, species preservation, and a planet going off the cliff, it is what several billion people do that makes a difference. The solution? Not scientists, not politicians, not activists. Cue the economists.

The hope of mankind, and indeed of every living thing on the planet, is now in the hands of the masters of the dismal science. But Will the Planet Notice? is the Environmental Defense Fund economist Gernot Wagners tour of global economics and of the economists wrestling with the scope of climate chaos and the means of realigning incentives to resolve the threat.

About the Author

Gernot Wagner is an economist at the Environmental Defense Fund, where he is a key member of the economic policy group working to develop and apply economically sound climate policy in the United States and internationally.

You are one of seven billion people on Earth. Put bluntly, whatever you do personally&#8212;eat tofu in a Hummer or hamburgers in a Prius&#8212;the planet doesnt care. Nor, for that matter, does the economy. In view of the entwined challenges of climate change, species preservation, and a planet going off the cliff, it is what several billion people do that makes a difference. The solution? Not scientists, not politicians, not activists. Cue the economists.

The hope of mankind, and indeed of every living thing on the planet, is now in the hands of the masters of the dismal science. But Will the Planet Notice? is the Environmental Defense Fund economist Gernot Wagners tour of global economics and of the economists wrestling with the scope of climate chaos and the means of realigning incentives to resolve the threat.

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